by Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n
PJ Media<\/em><\/p>\n Paradoxical President<\/strong><\/p>\n The Obama administration has offered a number of recent fantasies. Here are a few examples.<\/p>\n a) Despite owning the presidency, the House and a filibuster-proof Senate between 2009-10, the president could not introduce an immigration bill, in the manner he rammed through healthcare? What nefarious force stopped him, and why does he blame \u201cthem\u201d in a recent speech in El Paso? Who are \u201cthey,\u201d who so illiberally sidetracked his immigration visions during his first two years, and instead preferred \u201calligators and moats\u201d to reform? Democrats in the House, Senate, or administration between 2009 and 2010?<\/p>\n b) How in the El Paso speech can one pontificate about and deplore partisan politics and \u201cugly rhetoric\u201d on immigration when at the same time asking the audience to log on to a White House website to lobby for the president\u2019s political agenda \u2014 a few months after asking \u201cLatinos\u201d to \u201cpunish\u201d their Republican \u201cenemies\u201d? Is the latter \u201cugly rhetoric\u201d? If not, why? And was it not more ugly rhetoric, when his whipped-up audience interrupted his own cheerleading with \u201cthey\u2019re racists!\u201d.<\/p>\n c) Obama also swore that 650 miles of border fencing of all sorts along a 1,900 mile-plus Mexico-US border means that the border fence \u201cis basically completed\u201d. How does less than one third of a task constitute \u201cbasically completed?\u201d What does \u201cbasically\u201d mean?<\/p>\n d) In his speech on the debt a month ago, Obama seemed confused over the sudden additional $5 trillion in debt. But who ran that up between 2009-2011? A Republican House, Senate, or President Bush? A Republican-controlled Congress? And what happened to his own debt commission?<\/p>\n e) If not raising income tax rates was smart in December 2010, why is raising them suddenly smart in April 2011?<\/p>\n f) Why was voting against raising the debt ceiling in 2006 considered principled when we owed $8 trillion, but it is not when we owe $14?<\/p>\n g) We are to believe that future additional drilling in the US will not help lower world oil or gas prices, but calling on the Middle East to pump more, or praising Brazil\u2019s proposed commitment to offshore exploration, will?<\/p>\n h) What role does inviting a rap \u201cpoet\u201d to the White House who has praised a cop-killer and invoked violent imagery about the former president play in the promised new age of civility?<\/p>\n i) How can increasing five-fold Predator targeted assassination missions against suspected terrorists, dropping precision bombs to take out the person and family of Muammar Qaddafi, and ordering a hit on Bin Laden be considered okay, but waterboarding three admitted terrorists who claimed responsibility for 9\/11, and gave information that led to the demise of bin Laden be considered both amoral and illegal?<\/p>\n j) How can we praise the authority of the UN and our newfound compliance with its authorizations, when we cite a UN resolution to offer humanitarian aid and to enforce a no-fly-zone over Libya \u2014 but then deliberately subvert them by trying to bomb and kill Qaddafi, whose destruction is and is not the object of our campaign, but most certainly not in the praised UN resolution?<\/p>\n A Method to the Madness<\/strong><\/p>\n As before, I will let readers decide the answers to the above questions from the usual alternatives previously discussed:<\/p>\n a) Obama has no idea of what he is doing, so he makes things up daily without worry that they often contradict what he has said before, or make no sense at all: no drill here, drill in Brazil; whatever \u2014 when do we tee off?<\/p>\n b) Obama knows exactly what he is doing \u2014 shifting positions hourly, without worry about prior statements, to reflect political, poll-based realities \u2014 but he counts on the media, his rhetorical skills, and his supporters to play down inconsistencies and hypocrisies: What do 51% feel today about spending, healthcare, higher taxes \u2014 okay, give another exemption from Obamacare or another talk on the deficit.<\/p>\n c) All presidents make up things and flip-flop; Obama is thus typical not exceptional: why should I care what I said as a senator or campaigner \u2014 did you really expect me to turn down Goldman Sachs and BP money to abide by campaign finance reform?<\/p>\n d) In all these cases, there is a pattern: the liberal vision is more noble and therefore justifies the means to achieve it, even if at times it proves inconsistent, hypocritical, and illogical. What some call hypocrisy and contradiction is just the rocky road of politics necessary to get to the promised progressive land: you have to bring a gun to a knife fight and \u2018get in their faces\u2019 to bring hope and change.<\/p>\n 2012 Campaign<\/strong><\/p>\n One thing is certain; we have now seen the blueprint of the 2012 campaign. It consists of four parts:<\/p>\n 1) There will be no reference to or defense of four years of record massive debt, sky-high gas prices, creeping inflation, 9% unemployment, or slow growth \u2014 only on the \u201cmess\u201d that Obama inherited 48 months prior.<\/p>\n 2) Constant demonization of a bogeyman \u201cthey\u201d and \u201cthem\u201d: Sometimes it will be old George Bush, sometimes John Boehner and his House, sometime BP-type CEOs, sometime Tea-party reactionaries. Such partisan selfish types want to throw Down Syndrome children into the street, deny Juan Lopez his PhD because of a minor immigration technicality, and insist on tax breaks for their junkets to Costa del Sol, Martha\u2019s Vineyard, or Vail.<\/p>\n 3) Race all the time: a sort of passive\/aggressive invocation of race. On the one hand, we get the beer summit and reckless charges against the Boston police, Eric Holder\u2019s \u201cmy people\u201d\/\u201dcowards\u201d, \u201cwise Latina\u201d, \u201csit in the back\u201d of the car, Van Jones\u2019 rants, a cop-hating rapper in the White House, juxtaposed with accusations from Obama supporters of racists and biased opponents of the Obama agenda: Emphasize racial tensions, then charge racism when anyone resents such divisiveness.<\/p>\n 4) Money and media: raise a billion dollars from the Wall Street and corporate BP\/Goldman Sachs types that one trashes publicly. Ignore public campaign financing again, while praising government intervention everywhere else. Praise and court high-brow media (NPR,\u00a0New York Times<\/em>, CBS, NBC, etc) while not letting up on the usual demons \u2014 Fox, Limbaugh, Hannity, Drudge, etc.<\/p>\n The debate will be over 2008, not 2009-2012; the issues will be the callousness of conservatives, not the bankruptcy and recessionary economy of the nation; most criticism of Obama will arise from racial animosity, and big money will be as courted privately as those who make it are publicly scorned.<\/p>\n Get ready, it should be interesting\u2026<\/p>\n \u00a92011 Victor Davis Hanson<\/p>\n<\/div>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":" by Victor Davis Hanson PJ Media Paradoxical President The Obama administration has offered a number of recent fantasies. Here are a few examples.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":1,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"jetpack_post_was_ever_published":false,"_jetpack_newsletter_access":"","_jetpack_newsletter_tier_id":0,"footnotes":"","jetpack_publicize_message":"","jetpack_is_tweetstorm":false,"jetpack_publicize_feature_enabled":true,"jetpack_social_post_already_shared":false,"jetpack_social_options":{"image_generator_settings":{"template":"highway","enabled":false}}},"categories":[362,536],"tags":[12,1026,1064,473,128,88,213,160,1042,1037,67],"jetpack_publicize_connections":[],"jetpack_featured_media_url":"","jetpack_sharing_enabled":true,"jetpack_shortlink":"https:\/\/wp.me\/p466Sb-O4","jetpack_likes_enabled":true,"jetpack-related-posts":[{"id":3059,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/alligators-moats-and-other-such-nonsense\/","url_meta":{"origin":3104,"position":0},"title":"Alligators, Moats and Other Such Nonsense","author":"victorhanson","date":"May 23, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services President Obama gave what was billed as an important speech on immigration last week near the border in El Paso, Texas. Unfortunately, it was one of the most demagogic moments in recent presidential history. Nearly everything Obama said was either factually incorrect or\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Immigration"","block_context":{"text":"Immigration","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/immigration\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1511,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/obamas-new-take-on-partisanship\/","url_meta":{"origin":3104,"position":1},"title":"Obama’s New Take on Partisanship","author":"victorhanson","date":"July 9, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson National Review Online One of President Obama\u2019s strangest complaints is that there are too many in Congress who act, well, like former senator Obama. In his recent speech on the question of comprehensive immigration reform, President Obama once again blasted Republican political opportunism that opposes his\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "July 2010"","block_context":{"text":"July 2010","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2010\/july-2010\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":2451,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/obama-verses-obama\/","url_meta":{"origin":3104,"position":2},"title":"Obama Verses Obama","author":"victorhanson","date":"August 14, 2011","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Defining Ideas President Barack Obama is more exasperated than ever as polls dip, critics multiply, and none of his massive borrowing seems to jump start a stalled economy. He seems bewildered that House Republicans did not immediately agree to his tax increases proposals, and confused over\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "First Term Policies"","block_context":{"text":"First Term Policies","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/obama-administration\/first-term-policies\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":1809,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/obama-too-little-too-late\/","url_meta":{"origin":3104,"position":3},"title":"Obama–Too Little, Too Late","author":"victorhanson","date":"March 1, 2010","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services The United States may very well owe a crushing $20 trillion by 2020. And thus President Obama last week named a bipartisan commission to find ways to address our national debt. Such a Periclean response might sound sincere and worthwhile. But it comes\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "March 2010"","block_context":{"text":"March 2010","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/archives\/2010\/march-2010\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":655,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/supreme-court-hypocrisies\/","url_meta":{"origin":3104,"position":4},"title":"Supreme Court Hypocrisies","author":"victorhanson","date":"July 10, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson Tribune Media Services Until last week, Chief Justice John Roberts was vilified as the leader of a conservative judicial cabal poised to destroy the Obama presidency by overturning the federal takeover of healthcare. But with his unexpected affirmation, Roberts suddenly was lauded as the new Earl\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Punditry"","block_context":{"text":"Punditry","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/opinion\/punditry\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]},{"id":426,"url":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/the-fantasy-house\/","url_meta":{"origin":3104,"position":5},"title":"The Fantasy House","author":"victorhanson","date":"September 29, 2012","format":false,"excerpt":"by Victor Davis Hanson PJ Media It All Failed? By Fantasy House I do not mean \u2014 or rather only mean \u2014 Barack Obama\u2019s La-La land in which Austrians speak Austrian, Hawaii is in Asia, Afghans speak Arabic, the Maldives lie off Argentina, there are seven additional states, servicemen are\u2026","rel":"","context":"In "Commentary"","block_context":{"text":"Commentary","link":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/ahref=\/index.php\/categories\/angry-reader\/categorylink\/a\/obama-administration\/commentary-obama-administration\/"},"img":{"alt_text":"","src":"","width":0,"height":0},"classes":[]}],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3104"}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/1"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=3104"}],"version-history":[{"count":3,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3104\/revisions"}],"predecessor-version":[{"id":3106,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/3104\/revisions\/3106"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=3104"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=3104"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/victorhanson.com\/wordpress\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=3104"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}